


Teach Me Your Ways

by XtaticPearl



Series: The Parker-Stark-Rhodes-Hogan-Potts-Danvers Family [1]
Category: Captain America (Movies), Iron Man (Movies), Marvel, Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Dad!Tony, Fluff, Gen, Post-Captain America: Civil War (Movie), Smol Son!Peter
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-28
Updated: 2016-12-28
Packaged: 2018-09-12 20:47:22
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,500
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9090115
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/XtaticPearl/pseuds/XtaticPearl
Summary: Peter asks Tony for advice a couple of times. Tony helps. Well, tries to.





	

“There’s no such thing”  


“Really?” Peter squinted at the site on his StarkPhone and looked up at the man sitting across the table nursing the third cup of coffee, “But the internet says it’s a sure shot way?”  


“Kid, has the internet dated real live people?” Tony asked in a dry tone before taking a sip of his espresso, “Trust me, there’s no such thing as be yourself. Think about it, which ‘yourself’ are you talking about? The one on a laundry day or the one on a Sunday spit-shined shoes day? The one before coffee or the one after three all-nighters? There’s too many variables for it all to go wrong.”  


“That sounds…weirdly specific,” Peter said after a blink but nevertheless deleted his 13th suggestion off the list, “Okay, so what’s the plan then?”  


Tony eyed Peter from over his yellow glasses and raised an eyebrow. Taking another chug of his drink, the genius leaned back on the garish red chair, taking his time before responding.

“Well, the whole first impressions crap is out the window, clearly,” Tony mused, looking a bit self-depreciating for a second before he continued, “and the faking overconfidence route leads to doomdom.”  


“So…act like you?” Peter offered and got a pointed look in return.  


“What have I told you about being like me?”  


“Don’t?” Peter replied and sighed before slumping over the cafe table, cradling his head in his hands, “Well, this is totally helpful.”  


“Hmmm,” Tony hummed and Peter tilted his head to look at him balefully but Tony simply snorted, “You gotta go about this with a plan. A carefully constructed, long-term plan.”  


“Please don’t tell me to read Cosmo,” Peter said in a horrified tone and Tony blinked before narrowing his eyes.  


“Why the hell do you read Cosmo, spiderling? You know what, don’t tell me,” Tony waved his hand in a dismissive gesture before leaning forward, “Think of this as a science experiment. You gotta have the right ingredients in the right temperature and environment to get the right results.”  


“Right,” Peter nodded and blinked, “Wait, what?”  


Tony sighed.

“Oh, you young impressionable mind, the things we have to learn.”  


—  


“Are you sure? I could always sneak out and get into detention myself,” Peter whispered into the phone, sitting on the toilet and jiggling his legs.  


“Peter, acting like a delinquent does not impress smart girls,” Tony replied, biting into an apple and making a face at Rhodey who rolled his eyes from across the room. Spinning around on his chair, Tony continued, looking out the floor to ceiling windows, “Trust me, nobody knows that better than me.”  


“…that sounds like you’re speaking from -”  


“Yes,” Tony cut him short before the awkward question could be completed, “Now get out of the toilet and get back to class. Let your muse of drunken glory finish her detention slumbering into her own arms.”  


“Wow, never thought the day I’d see _you_  tell someone to get back to class,” Rhodey smirked when Tony cut the call.  


“Yeah, well, kid’s got no original game to match his firecracker,” Tony huffed and threw the half-eaten apple at his snorting best friend, “Whatever, let’s get going. Ross needs his daily quote of eating my brain.”  


—-

“But I -”  


“No”  


“It’s just -”  


“No, Pete”  


“C’mon, it’s just one side!”  


“Buddy, if making a grafitti of your crush on monuments ever impressed people, then every person who visited public restrooms would be swooning over weirdos,” Tony said firmly before slinging an arm around Peter’s shoulder, “Now c’mon, I’ve got a new gizmo to test and you’re my guinea spider today.”  


“You talk like you have any other volunteers,” Peter huffed and Tony raised an impressed eyebrow of snark but led the boy to the workshop with more comments about improving his suit.  


—-

“I don’t wanna talk”  


Tony stuffed another mouthful of _khao mein_  but kept quiet when Peter shuffled around his rice in the container. May had gone out on a work related trip for two days and Peter had been forced to bunk at the Compound by mutual agreement, a compromise after May had lost her temper at Peter for breaking the rule of not engaging with more than two enemies in one week.

“Okay”  


“It’s just so stupid,” Peter said quietly, not looking up from his container and picking at his food, “I thought…”  


Tony eyed the boy who still had a fading scar on his cheek after the last bout of bullying he had allowed at school. Tony knew that May had blown a fuse at the PTA meet for that but he also knew that bullies weren’t bound by that most often. He mentally reminded himself to slip in a mini-kit of comparatively less harmful zinger gadgets and maybe even pay a visit to a certain Queens high school.

“Pass the sauce,” Tony gestured with his chopsticks but Peter didn’t respond, still messing with his food. Shaking his head lightly, Tony put down his own container and leaned forward to pick up the sauce, leaning over Peter in a reminiscent way of their first car conversation after Germany.  


When Peter’s arms came up around him in a vice-like hug, Tony stilled and almost moved back but relaxed and slowly returned the hug when he felt the kid hold on with a sense of strange desperation.

“She’ll come around, kiddo,” Tony said quietly, even as he knew that the statement was a meaningless one. It didn’t matter that MJ would come around or notice Peter in another year or so. It still hurt to watch the girl you like being with someone else, especially someone who bullied you relentlessly.  


“No, she won’t,” Peter said in a way only broken hearted teenagers could and Tony sighed before tentatively ruffling the boy’s brown hair a bit and leaning back.  


“Yeah, well, you’ve still got FRIDAY,” he said with a small smirk and Peter choked out a laugh, “Girl’s pretty much a done deal with you, as far as I see it. And let me tell you, an AI girlfriend is far better than a human one.”  


“Yeah, you would say that,” Peter shot back but with a small grin that lessened the sting and Tony shrugged before stealing some of Peter’s rice.  


“Whatever, rice-hater”  


—

“Whoa, it’s actually you,” the girl said with a stunned look before it morphed into one of charm and confidence, “It’s good to see you, Mr. Stark. We’re all really excited to have you here.”  


“Yeah? Strange,” Tony shrugged with a polite grin and shook the girl’s hand before eyeing the boy standing next to her, “Well, how could I refuse the invitation of Mr. Parker? Young, budding photographer like him, hard to get. Most flattering pictures I’ve been in since a long time.”  


“Oh!” the redhead blinked before smiling softly at her companion and nodding at Tony, “Yeah, he is pretty good.”  


“Mhhmm,” Tony hummed and eyed the slightly blushing boy before smiling at the girl, “Now, which way is the magic? I heard that you’ve got some interesting science to show this year…”  


—-

“Hey, did I ever tell you thanks?”  


Tony turned his head, looking away from the stars they were observing and looked at the unmasked but still in costume Spiderman.

“Not enough I’m sure, but for what exactly?” Tony asked and Peter shrugged.  


“Just…everything?”  


Tony took a minute, thinking about the way Peter was carefully avoiding him and looked a bit awkward - the classic signs of someone embarrassed about being sincere but actually being truly that.

It had been an intense but fun journey, mentoring the kid and looking over him after the mess which had first brought them together. For all his wisdom, and it was golden, Tony would never have guessed that he would ever find whatever connection he had with this kid who never listened to preservation advice or sane warnings. He remembered May looking at him with an unreadable expression on a Sunday when he had gone to pick Peter up for ‘science time’ and shaking her head when he had asked about it.

_Nothing. Just seeing what was never hidden,_ she had said and Tony had edged away from the cryptic message.

Maybe he understood what she meant. Maybe it was always out in the open. Maybe Happy was right when he called him the dork duo. 

Maybe a lot of things.

“Sure, kid,” Tony said and turned back to look at the stars, sharing a quiet moment with a hero he had never intended to adopt but had ever had a choice regarding it either.  


“Hey, wanna grab Chinese and ice cream?” he asked as he stood up to get back to the Compound and Peter looked at him before springing out a web to the building across.  


“Make it hotdogs and you’ve got a deal,” the kid said before slinging away, trusting that Tony would follow.  


It wasn’t right for the kid to follow the dad always anyway, was it?

**Author's Note:**

> This will be a collection of stories involving the found family of Parker-Stark-Rhodes-Hogan-Potts-Danvers. Feedback please?


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